AL CAPP - TYPED LETTER SIGNED 09/10/1963 - HFSID 169232

AL CAPP
This thank you note, signed by cartoonist Al Capp, was typed on Capp's stationery personalized with his most famous character, Li'l Abner, in 1963. Accompanied by a photocopy of the March 31, 1952 cover of Life with the cover story "Why I Let Li'l Abner Marry".
Typed letter signed "Al Capp". With black ink notation on verso in unknown hand. 1 page, 5½x8½, on Capp's personalized stationery with a bust cartoon of Li'l Abner printed near left edge. Sept. 10, 1963. Addressed to Mr. Frank Condon, Holliston, Massachusetts. In full: "Dear Frank Condon: Thank you from Li'l Abner and me. Sincerely". Lightly toned, soiled, stained and creased. Tape residue at top edge. Light show-through from ink notation on verso (does not touch signature). Folded once and unfolded. Otherwise in fine condition. Accompanied by: Unsigned color copy of a Life magazine cover, March 31, 1952 issue. Cover story: "Why I Let Li'l Abner Marry. By Al Capp". Facsimile signature. Lightly creased. Photocopy reproduced defects in original. Paper loss on verso (no show-through). Otherwise in fine condition. Li'l Abner had been a bachelor for 18 years, from the comic's premier in 1934. In that time, he had managed to fend off the advances of Daisy Mae and outrace her in the annual Sadie Hawkins Day races. However, Capp finally decided to hitch the two together in 1952. The marriage made national headlines and made the front cover of Life. Capp (1909-1979, born Alfred Gerald Capin in New Haven, Connecticut) lost his right leg in a trolley accident at the age of nine and spent five years in high school without receiving a diploma, yet went on to create one of America's most-loved, and certainly longest-running, comic strip, Li'l Abner. He started out drawing Mister Gilfeather,a one-panel cartoon in New York City, a cartoon that he reportedly hated. He met Ham Fisher in 1933 and worked with him on Joe Palooka before beginning the cartoon that he'd become known for: Li'l Abner, which first appeared in The New York Mirror in 1934. Li'l Abner, which ran until Al Capp's retirement in 1977, detailed the exploits of the rustic inhabitants of Dogpatch, USA and spawned, among other things, a Broadway musical that ran 693 performances from 1956 to 1958, a 1959 film with an Oscar-nominated score, a theme park in Marble Falls, Arkansas called Dogpatch USA (now closed) and the Sadie Hawkins dance, after a fictional Dogpatch holiday called Sadie Hawkins Day.